dd is 9 soon (in process of being dx), but still spends most of her nights sleeping on our floor. We assumed she would grow out of this once ds1 left (she was almost permenantly in our room for a while whilst the home situation was very difficult).

However, she really struggles to get to bed (very long drawn out routine despite visual timetable), and then to settle (she has a story, reads for a bit, but at lights out struggles to drop off. She comes in repeatedly saying she can't sleep, or else scared with tears. When we have challenged this, the resulting anxiety and tears are just not worth the effort, so she sleeps on our floor (asleep within minutes). If she does settle in her own room, she will often move to our floor during the night (we are too tired to try and settle her back).

It's not the end of the world that she sleeps on our floor (and someone pointed out she's unlikely to be doing that at 13), but we would really like her to be able to learn some ways that she can help herself relax to get to sleep in her own room.

As to not doing it when she is 13, whilst it probably will have reduced it's not out of the question; we had an 18 year old sleep in our room recently. It was a one off caused by high anxiety and an inability to talk to us as we had gone t bed., When he was 12 he struggled at school and had one of us sleep in the spare bed in his room. He used to go to sleep listening to the same music every night. As his anxiety reduced when education was changed he reduced the number of nights he needed someone else there and then went on to sleep on his own apart from the very occasional night.

In our experience 2 things disrupt sleep; anxiety and screen time. Ours have 2 hours between the time we stop the use of phones and computers, and their bedtime. We also put the emphasis on rest, not on sleep; you can't make yourself go to sleep, but you can rest your body and your eyes. If minds are racing then we allow music and reading, even in the middle of the night. This has not been abused, but I recognise that other youngsters may push the boundaries.

For us sleep was more important than where we slept. We found that we didn't get woken in the night by sleeping in the spare bed, and our son slept better too. What suited us won't suit everyone, what you need is a solution that suits you and your family. Relaxation techniques might help, soothing music. Enclosing the bed also helped our son, we put a curtain alongside his bed, not unlike a four poster which helped him feel enclosed and protected; others might find this restrictive. You can get tents and canopies for children's beds to give the same effect.

Thanks IP. She often says she's scared, she can hear things, or just she can't stop thinking... I think anxiety plays a part. We are quite strict with screen time too. I like the idea of emphasising rest not sleep, and will try some of the other ideas as well.

We have also found the easiest way to maximise our sleep (much needed) is to have her on the floor when she needs to.